Just kicking around some CP artwork ideas. I am toying with naming the Cab Blackbird after one of my favorite airplanes. I made a CP with the SR-71and a F-16 escort. I still want to do some more artwork around the buttons and label everytyhing.

I am going to use some of mamemarquees stock artwork for the CP and marquee. Just having too much trouble designing my own. PixelHugger has some great artwork on the site and I am pretty sure that is the way I am going to go. The cab will look great with it and I really want to start playing a few games on it!

Speakers are mounted. I routed out the MDF a little over halfway so the speakers would sit a little lower. I have some round 120mm grill covers that should look pretty cool when they are mounted. Once everything is painted black it will hopefully all come together.

On top of the bezel I am going to install a sheet of smoked Plexiglas. I took some advice here and decided not to fear plexi and don't pay for Lexan. A local Window/glass shop in the area (Hals Glass in Bellflower in case someone is interested) was great to deal with and had the 1/8" smoked plexi in stock. There are 2 shades for plexiglass and I went with the light lighter one - I believe it was called bronze although make sure before you buy.

I stared out by test routing a piece before I jumped in the deep end. It was sandwiched between 2 pieces of MDF. Once again my cutting board came in handy and I used the pattern cutting bit that cut the second side of my cab.

TEST PLEXI

Very easy with no signs of cracking. So I used my bezel to trace a pattern on the plexi. Did the rest...

ROUTE PLEXI

After about 10 minutes of routing it was done. Pexi was fit in the cab and all I have left to do is mount it. The black Happs bezel is under the plexi in the pic

SCREEN INSTALLED

I can use a few clips and not drill any holes or drill a few holes to mount it. Not sure yet. I did test drill a few holes in some scrap pieces and there were no problems. Don't fear plexiglas.

Started the CP today. Basically I brought in a visio drawing of my CP to Kinkos and they blew it up to the size of the CP. Taping it on the CP I made pilot holes for all the buttons, joysticks and track ball. After that I pulled the print out off the CP and drilled all the holes. 1 1/8" for the buttons and 1 3/8" for the sticks with 1 1/2 inches between the buttons measured center to center. Trackball layout was routed to make it flush.

I am still not sure where the 4 way J-Stick and Spinner are going to go.

CP in the raw is done. Just needs some primer for the arwork to stick to and some artwork. Above the right 6-pack of buttons I am going to mount a Top Fire joystick for tron, gorf and any others that I can think of. Next to it (small hole by the trackball cut out) will be the spinner. This should work out nicely for tron and buttons are close by for arkanoid, tempest and any other spinner games. 4-way stick is going to mount above the left 6-pack of buttonsRAW CP

The 4-way j-stick was a challenge to mount. All the other joy sticks will be mounted below the CP. The 4-way stick was too short so I had to mount it above. I had to use the slotted holes for the carriage bolts, cut out the inside for the guts of the joystick and finally route it all so the top would sit flush.

While test fitting the CP top to the base I did not like the fit so I routed out a slot for the strip hinge to fit into. It sits flush now. In the picture you can also see how the cp base is mounted to the frame. The L-Shaped piece of metal next to the large cut out will hold a switch to enable and disable admin buttons on the CP. The Latch in the center will hold the top down so I can go in through the coin door to "pop the hood". You can also make out the 3 holes on the side for pinball.

Looks like I have a name for the Cab. VORTEX. This has been incredibly fun and rewarding building this.. the planning and design both from building it from scratch to playing with all the software that will go into it. I honestly think that for every hour I have spent woodworking or doing some kind of fabrication on the cab I have spent an hour with software.

I have been prepping the cab for painting and going over of the small details of the cab. One of the goals for the cab is it has to be portable. It is going to take a few guys to lift it, but I want to be able to move the cab around. All fixtures need to be firmly attached and that is also one of the reasons I went with a plexi monitor cover and not glass. The CP has to be removable so all connections to it will be molex type plugs. PC is bolted to the sides and speakers and light fixtures are held securely.

The marquee and CP came back from mamemarquees last week. The CP color was off and Scott was very nice about printing a new CP. The marquee looks good. I made a light box for the cab will get some pics of it in action when it is finally mounted. Here is a pic of the marquee and light box.

PAINT! Man, 2 hours to paint the first coat of primer. I used a spay gun and compressor and it looks good. I have never used a paint gun before so it was slow going. There are still some spots that look a little blotchy but that might be because it is wet still. Will get a better look tomorrow and if there is no rain I will start the first coat of black. I bet the spray gun took me 20 minutes just to clean the dam thing.

First coat of black paint on the cab. I am sure it will need at least one more and after that I will just see how it looks. It took me about 2 hours total to paint it with clean up. Next major step is to assemble and wire the CP. I am still waiting on the re-printed CP overlay as it should be in any day now.

I did not route the underside. The perfect 360's and the top mount's throw are fine with 5/8" MDF. I am not going to use plexi on top. The 4 way j-stick will be mounted on top because of the short throw.

If I had to do thing all over I would go a different route. However, when I first stared doing research on Cabinets early 2005 I had absolutely no idea what was involved in making one. I checked out all the designs I could find and liked Scott's over all look of his cab the most. I ran across a track and field clone cab at a local business and grabbed it hoping that I could make the cab work for a mame machine. It turned out to be too small for the monitor I wanted and making the CP I wanted would have looked bad. Real bad. It was good to see how a cab was constructed and I was able to pull a bunch of hardware out of it.

So, I was back to Scotts cab and just go for it. The frame adds 50-60 pounds and makes it real sturdy. Is it necessary? Probably not knowing what I know now about MDF construction. It does make it nice to bolt the monitor and PC to real wood and it hides the casters nicely. All my components are screwed into the frame not MDF- not essential but nice.

If I had to do at all over I would go with a simple 2X4 base frame and find a cab at a local arcade to measure it out to make my sides, back and CP based on those measurements and the width of my doors. I would then bolt the monitor to the top of the frame using what ever angle I needed. Hind sight is as they say 20-20.

On a cab building note. Second coat of paint went on today, it is looking like a real cab now. If it looks ok tomorrow after it dries I will start final assembly. The reprinted CP overlay has shipped and I am sure the CP wiring will take a day or two. I have some left over 10 foot cat5 patch cords that have the tips busted off. The wire works great for buttons and sticks - 80 feet of wire per cable.

What did you do with the green (ground) wires coming from the trackball?

show us the otherside of the CP

I am not using the ground wires from the TB. It is just a big mouse and works just fine with out them. I will give you an overall shot when I am done. It is real close now.. just need a few more parts.

I wired up the CP for the most part yesterday. Took me about 6 hours total... and for the most part it worked 100% first time. Notice in the picture that one perfect 360 is totally missing. It was a defective unit and is on its way back to Happs for warranty replacement. Some of the wires still need to be secured and cleaned up.

Shot of the admin switch - enables and disables the Escape, pause, mouse 1 and mouse 2 keys. So in effect it will lock down the cab when switched. So if people want to change games at a party I have to come over and switch it. The wiring block close to the admin switch is a common ground. Each half of the CP is wired into it along with the coin door, both sets of pinball buttons, the admin switch and the lone blue button. It is then connected to the mini-pac.

What did you do with the green (ground) wires coming from the trackball?

show us the otherside of the CP

I am not using the ground wires from the TB. It is just a big mouse and works just fine with out them. I will give you an overall shot when I am done. It is real close now.. just need a few more parts.

I just spent the last 20 min reading through your build and have to say, "Awesome work!" I hope it's not too late to ask, but what type of paint did you go with. I have been going back and forth about spraying and laminate as I have never used a sprayer before.

Logged

My old user name was marlborroman13, but I kicked the habit many years ago!

Alright. Who wants some? Who's next? Huh? How 'bout it? Who wants some? Huh? Who wants to have a little? You. You want some more? Huuuh? You want a little? Do ya? Huh? You want some more? Huh? Huh? Hh!

I just spent the last 20 min reading through your build and have to say, "Awesome work!" I hope it's not too late to ask, but what type of paint did you go with. I have been going back and forth about spraying and laminate as I have never used a sprayer before.

2 coasts (should have done 3 really) Interior Acrylic semi-gloss over a coat of Kilz acrylik primer tinted grey. The can said great for heavy wear areas like trim and kitchen.

Cabinet is done. The only outstanding issue wouyld be side art and I am not sure if I am going to put any on. Here are some completed pics. I will have to put up some more pics when I can roll it outside and get some better lighting.